financial crisis

In 2013, a Ford F-150 sold every 41 seconds, which helped to make the company a 7.6 billion dollar profit. In the years leading up to their financial crisis, Ford may have ridden this success and stayed with the same formula. But, that’s not the mentality that they have going into 2014. Recently, Ford has been getting a lot of publicity for a new line of F-150s that will debut this year. These new trucks have shed an astonishing 700 pounds to the overall truck weight, while still maintaining the full body size.

Across the board, consumers and dealers seem to be excited and are applauding the move. Ford feels the same way; Chief executive Alan Mulally was quoted as saying, “You’re either moving ahead and you’re improving and you’re making [your vehicles] more valuable and more useful to the customer or you’re not.” Even more impressively, this new truck will be able to haul more and tow more because the engine won’t be working as hard to carry excess weight.

This well-received innovation could have been enough for America’s most historic automaker. But once again, it wasn’t. Within the last few days, reports have emerged from the Washington Auto Show saying that Ford is making a serious push in the autonomous vehicle department, as well. At the Auto Show, Ford showcased its automated Ford Fusion Hybrid research car to onlookers that included President Obama. Impressed by theFord displays, Obama said, “When you look at all these cars, it is a testimony to the outstanding work that’s been done by workers, American workers, American designers.”

Moving forward, Ford is propelling this venture by partnering up with two of America’s finest universities- Stanford and MIT- to perform research. Ford higher ups have said that MIT research will focus on ways to predict the actions of other vehicles and pedestrians, while Stanford research will focus on how the vehicle will maneuver in ways to allow sensors to visualize around obstructions.

This investment was very important for the company. In the upcoming years, Ford will be competing with a slew of rival automakers that are all struggling for control of the road’s future. It is believed that by 2025 automated cars will dominate the road (check out more about this here), meaning there is billions of dollars up for grab.

Ford’s chief operating officer Mark Fields agrees, “In the long term, we see a future of connected cars that communicate with each other and with the world around them to improve safety, reduce traffic congestion and

Ford’s autonomous research car

achieve major environmental benefits… Our goal is to offer a level of technology in which a driver is still in control and still able to enjoy the driving experience, but in a better, safer and more efficient way.”

Even though the future of innovation is uncertain as far as the roads go, there is one thing that we do know: Ford will be in the mix.